'Twill be but justice that your censure tarry, Till you give some: and when six times you have seen't, If this play do not like, the Devil is in't.

5 If this play do not like, &c.] i. e. please. The quibble in the text had already furnished Decker with a title for his play of Belphegor.

DRAMATIS PERSONE.

SATAN, the great devil.
PUG, the less devil.

INIQUITY, the Vice.

FABIAN FITZDOTTREL, a squire of Norfolk.

MEERCRAFT, the projector.

EVERILL, his champion.

WITTIPOL, a young gallant.

EUSTACE MANLY, his friend.

ENGINE, a broker.

TRAINS, the projector's man.
THOMAS GILTHEAD, a goldsmith.
PLUTARCHUS, his son.

Sir PAUL EITHERSIDE, a lawyer, and justice.
AMBLER, gentleman-usher to lady Tailbush.
SLEDGE, a smith, the constable.

SHACKLES, keeper of Newgate.

Mrs. FRANCES FITZDOTTREL.

Lady EITHERSIDE.

Lady TAILBUSH, the lady projectress.

PITFALL, her woman.

Serjeants, Officers, Servants, Underkeepers, &c.

SCENE, London.

OH, hoh, hoh, hoh, hoh, hoh, hoh, hoh!

To earth! and why to earth, thou foolish spirit?

What wouldst thou do on earth?

Pug. For that, great chief,

As time shall work. I do but ask my month

6 This first scene must be laid "e'en where the reader pleases." Satan and Pug, probably, make their entrance on the stage from a trap-door, (some rude representation, perhaps, of Hell-mouth), and the dialogue may be supposed to take place in their journey from the infernal regions. For these, and a thousand other incongruities, the absolute poverty and nakedness of the old stage furnished a ready apology.

7 Hoh, hoh, &c.] "The devil," Whalley says, in the old Mysteries and Moralities, "generally came roaring upon the stage with a cry of Ho, ho, ho!" This, with a great deal more, which he has taken from the commentators on Shakspeare, is all out of place here. It is not the roar of terror; but the boisterous expression of sarcastic merriment at the absurd petition of Pug, with which Satan makes his first appearance.

Which every petty, puisne devil has;
Within that term, the court of hell will hear
Something may gain a longer grant, perhaps.
Sat. For what? the laming a poor cow or two,
Entering a sow, to make her cast her farrow,
Or crossing of a market-woman's mare

'Twixt this and Tottenham ? these were wont to be Your main achievements, Pug: You have some plot

now,

Upon a tunning of ale, to stale the yeast,

8

Or keep the churn so, that the butter come not,
Spite of the housewife's cord, or her hot spit :
Or some good ribibe, about Kentish Town
Or Hogsden, you would hang now for a witch,
Because she will not let you play round Robin.
And you'll go sour the citizens' cream 'gainst Sunday,
That she may be accused for't, and condemn'd,
By a Middlesex jury, to the satisfaction

8 Or some good ribibe.] Bawd, or mistress of a brothel.
"This Sompnour, wayting evir on his pray,

Rode to summon an old wife, a ribibe."

Frere's Tale. WHAL.

Whalley, like Steevens, is too fond of licentious explanations. Ribibe, together with its synonym rebeck, is merely a cant expression for an old woman. A ribibe, the reader knows, is a rude kind of fiddle, and the allusion is probably to the inharmonious nature of its sounds. The word is used in a similar sense by Skelton :

"There came an olde rybibe;

She halted of a kybe," &c.

9 That she may be accused for't, and condemn'd

By a Middlesex jury, &c.] A reproof no less severe than merited. It appears from the records of those times, that many unfortunate creatures were condemned and executed on charges of the ridiculous nature here enumerated. In many instances, the judge was well convinced of the innocence of the accused, and laboured to save them; but such were the gross and barbarous prejudices of the juries, that they would seldom listen to his recommendations; and he was deterred from shewing mercy, in the last place, by the brutal ferociousness of the people, whose teeth were

Of their offended friends, the Londoners' wives, Whose teeth were set on edge with't. Foolish fiend! Stay in your place, know your own strength, and put

not

Beyond the sphere of your activity :

You are too dull a devil to be trusted
Forth in those parts, Pug, upon any affair
That may concern our name on earth.

It is not

Every one's work. The state of hell must care
Whom it employs, in point of reputation,

Here about London. You would make, I think,
An agent to be sent for Lancashire,10

Proper enough; or some parts of Northumberland,
So you had good instructions, Pug.

Pug. O chief,

You do not know, dear chief, what there is in me! Prove me but for a fortnight, for a week,

And lend me but a Vice, to carry with me,

To practise there with any play-fellow,

And you will see, there will come more upon't,

set on edge with't, and who clamoured tumultuously for the murder of the accused.

10 An agent to be sent for Lancashire.] This was the very hot-bed of witches. Not long before this play was written, fifteen of them had been indicted at one time, of whom twelve were condemned. Lancashire is still famous for its witches: they are said to frequent balls and music meetings, and, being in possession of spells and charms far more potent than those of their antiquated predecessors, to do a great deal of mischief to such as venture within the sphere of their influence.

1 And lend me but a Vice.] The buffoon of the old Mysteries and Moralities. He appears to have been a perfect counterpart of the Harlequin of the modern stage, and had a twofold office,to instigate the hero of the piece to wickedness, and, at the same time, to protect him from the devil, whom he was permitted to buffet and baffle with his wooden sword, till the process of the story required that both the protector and the protected should be carried off by the fiend; or the latter driven roaring from the stage by some miraculous interposition in favour of the repentant offender.